TOMMY GARCIA BONILLA v. STATE OF MARYLAND
Court of Special Appeals, Salmon, Filed May 27, 2014,
Illegal Sentence- Imposition of anything other than the agreed-upon sentence under an “ABA” plea agreement constitutes an “illegal sentence”, regardless of whether the sentence actually imposed is in excess of or falls below that agreed upon

Defendant was charged with a double homicide, agreeing to an offer to plea to two counts (1&3) in exchange for his testimony.

Under the agreement, the court would sentence the defendant to:
Count 3: life imprisonment
Count 1: a consecutive sentence of life imprisonment, with all but 20 years suspended

At sentencing, defense counsel misstated the agreement (which the State then confirmed) and the court imposed the following sentence:
Count 1: life imprisonment
Count 3: a consecutive sentence of life, suspend all but 20 years

More than two decades later, Bonilla filed a motion to correct an illegal sentence, arguing that ONLY count 1 could be amended so that his sentence would (confusingly) be:
Count 1: a consecutive sentence of life, suspend all but 20 years
Count 3: a consecutive sentence of life, suspend all but 20 years

The CoSA agreed that the sentence was illegal, but held that the entire original sentence should be re-imposed and not just a portion of it.

Notes from the court on Motion to Correct an Illegal Sentence

– A sentence that exceeds the sentence to which the parties agreed as part of a plea agreement constitutes an illegal sentence within the meaning of the Rule 4-345(a).
– Once the objective boundary markers for a sentence imposed by plea agreement have been established, variation from those markers constitutes an illegal sentence. “[T]he illegality that inheres in the sentence itself is obvious. Even if all of the antecedent proceedings had been procedurally impeccable, the illegality of the sentence is facial and self-evident.”
– Therefore, “any sentence imposed outside those boundaries that was lower than that agreed upon was illegal”